Contributors

Aerial Archaeology. In Romania and in Europe

By Rog Palmer, Irina Oberländer-Târnoveanu, Carmen Bem

For an Aerial Investigation Programme in Romania

Ioana Oltean

Abstract

With aerial photographs used for archaeological investigation as early as the First World War (C. Schuchhardt, 1918), Romania is not exactly a newcomer to aerial archaeology. Although the idea of a national scale programme was established in the 1970s, this failed to achieve a number of its targets due to the particular circumstances in force in relation to its operations. This paper discusses the feasibility of a modern, multi-annual, national programme of aerial archaeological investigation in Romania for archaeological research and heritage protection. It will analyse comparatively the benefits and shortcomings of previous aerial archaeology practice over the past decades and will highlight the immediate and longer-term priorities of aerial archaeology in Romania.

Dr. Ioana Oltean specialises in the archaeology of the Roman Empire, particularly in its European provinces, and in aerial archaeology. She is interested in the reconstruction of ancient landscapes and in the analysis of settlement pattern evolution from the Late Iron Age to the Roman period in the Lower Danube area in order to understand the nature and extent of the impact of Roman imperialism. Since 1998 she has been involved in establishing aerial reconnaissance as a standard method of archaeological prospection in Romania and has conducted aerial archaeological research in various parts of Transylvania and Dobrogea, along with W Muntenia and S Moldova. Her book Dacia : landscape, colonization, Romanisation which makes extensive use of aerial photographic data from Western Transylvania, was published in 2007 by Routledge and has been reprinted in paperback this summer.

Ioana Oltean is a Lecturer in Archaeology at Exeter University where she conducts and supervises research and teaches Roman archaeology, aerial archaeology and GIS at undergraduate and postgraduate level. She is a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of London and Scotland, a member of the Centre for Aerial Archaeology at the University of Glasgow, of the Aerial Archaeological Research Group and of the Society for the Promotion of Roman Studies. She conducts peer reviewing for various archaeological/cultural heritage journals and remote sensing conferences (EARSEL, ReSeArCH, SPIE), for the Newton International Fellowships (UK), and for the European Commission (FP7).